


Whoopsie Daisies

by SonjaJade



Series: The Rook and the Bluebird [5]
Category: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Accidents, F/M, Gardens & Gardening, House Sitting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-02
Updated: 2016-12-02
Packaged: 2018-09-03 17:28:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8722570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SonjaJade/pseuds/SonjaJade
Summary: While Braeda’s away, Maria will pray…





	

Maria stared at the piece of paper in her hand.  It was a list- no an _inventory_ \- of every houseplant her fiancé had in their small apartment.  Categorized by where they sat in their home, the pots were numbered and correlated to a cocktail of water and plant food that were premixed and sitting under the kitchen sink.

  1. _White Peace Lilly        Bottle 2            5 sprays at the root_
  2. _Bamboo Palm            Bottle 4            2 cups at roots, pull off brown leaves_
  3. _Xingese Evergreen     Bottle 4            about half a cup_
  4. _Amaryllis                   Bottle 1            ½ cup, chase with 1 cup water_
  5. _Devil’s Ivy                  Bottle 3            6 sprays-check food spike, change if brown_



And that was just the plants at the patio door.  There were four parts of the apartment _devoted_ to Braeda’s love of indoor gardening.  And it had taken him weeks to get the plants set up in a way that Maria could care for them without screwing his methodology up.  He’d hand written very specific instructions on caring for the some thirty plants, as well as how to make the solutions in his numbered bottles.  He wrote a schedule out for every day he would be in Ishval, to assist Mustang and Hawkeye in overseeing a quick snafu with the railroad planning.  Braeda expected to be gone a week, but wrote out the detailed directions for his flora for ten days, just in case.  
  
She sighed as she went about the daunting task of caring for them.  He’d told her before he left if she wasn’t comfortable trimming the leaves to just be sure that they all got watered.  That’s exactly what she intended to do.  While she loved Hey himself, his strange love for green things was not something they shared, at least not as passionately.  
  
Maria couldn’t grow anything before moving in with him, and now she had a single marigold pot out on the patio that he’d helped her tend to from the time it was just seeds in dirt.  Now it was full and lush, a buttery kind of orange with dark red edges.  Apart from that single pot, she didn’t really care one way or another about the green foliage in the apartment.  
  
After finishing the last indoor section, she moved outside to the patio.  She lovingly cared for her marigolds, and then went back to her list.  But instead of paying attention to what she was doing, she was trying to read while also reaching for ‘Bottle 4’, and knocked the whole thing off into the #8 pot.  
  
Horrified at what had happened, she quickly scanned down to #8 on the list and paled.  
  
 _8\. Gerbera Daisies                Bottle 2           4 sprays with water chaser_  
  
She’d just dumped half of Bottle 4 in there and had no idea what in the world to do.  Her eyes kept flicking back to ‘ _water chaser_ ’, so she rushed inside and grabbed the watering can.  She filled it quickly, then raced back to the patio and filled the pot until it over flowed, trying to dilute the plant food as best she could.  The next morning she did the same thing- gave it only water until it spilled out and prayed that would be enough to keep from killing the thing.  It didn’t matter anyway- her soon-to-be-husband returned later that evening and he’d be taking back over for her in the morning, without the need for a stupid list or silly bottle codes.

* * *

  
He was given a three day furlough to rest after the breakneck pace of the railroad incident, and so he decided to check how Maria had done with the plants.  As he went about his morning routine, carefully pinching off dead leaves and trimming longer ones with pure silver scissors, he felt she’d done a pretty good job of it all.  They all looked perky and happy, certainly none of them were dead or dying or wilted looking.  And then he made it to the patio.  He looked down at the daisy pot and whistled.  It had grown nearly twice its size and looked incredibly full.  
  
“Wow, I’ve been struggling to get this thing to fill out and she did it in only a week!”  He smiled as he sat it back in its place and gave it a few squirts of feeding mixture from the spray bottle and moved on to the Elephant Ears.  He’d have to ask her about it when she returned home from work.  
  
When he mentioned it to her over dinner (pot roast with carrots and onions, baked potatoes and blackberry cobbler), her face reddened and she stammered that she followed his notes to the letter.  
  
“Are you sure?” he asked, confused.  “I’ve been doing that tired routine with it for months and it’s never just… bloomed like that!”  
  
“I just did what you said to!” she shrugged as she rose to gather their plates and wash the dishes.  The matter was dropped, until Braeda looped his arms around her waist and kissed her neck.  She was reluctant to confess, so he simply drove her crazy until she wailed the truth.  
  
“Why didn’t you say so?  It’s one of those happy mistakes that artists talk about!”  
  
“I was afraid you’d be angry,” she whimpered.  
  
“I’m the exact opposite,” he murmured as he steered her toward the bathroom.  “Why don’t we have a nice hot bath to celebrate your fortunate accident, ‘kay?”  
  
Moments later, he started the water, adding some scented oil to it before carefully stripping them both out of their clothing.  He climbed in first, then settled her snugly in his lap.  As he washed her shoulders and back, the daisies were soon forgotten.


End file.
